Station Status

Back to Normal

Public Radio 89.5 KWGS and and Classical 88.7 KWTU are back on-air at normal power from our new antenna. All six digital HD Radio channels are broadcasting normally.

Listeners within the Tulsa metropolitan area were able to hear both stations broadcasting at low power while we replaced our antenna, thanks to our friends at Clear Channel Radio. Listeners in surrounding communities throughout northeastern Oklahoma were without NPR for nearly two weeks in September.

Progress Reports

Final Tuning

Sunday, October 10 @ 3:05pm

Public Radio 89.5 KWGS and and Classical 88.7 KWTU were off-the-air most of today as we made additional adjustments to the tuning of our new antenna. Fortunately, the winds were calm today so our tower crew was able to work quickly. It's been a month since both stations began broadcasting from our new antenna. Bolt tightness needed to be checked, connections examined for pressure leaks, and final adjustments made for maximum signal coverage and isolation between our twin interleaved analog and digital FM antennas.

Utterly Exhausted

Friday, September 10 @ 9:38pm

The low-power transmitters have been turned off and we're now broadcasting from the new antenna on our tower in Coweta. Our amazing tower climbers, Mac and Bear, were utterly exhausted from making minute adjustments to the antenna and then climbing away, dozens of times, all during terribly gusty winds. The photo at left shows a view of the center of the tower. Imagine being a thousand feet up, climbing up and down the ninety-foot length of our antenna, making adjustments while dangling outside the tower from a safety harness, and then scrambling to the other side of the tower so that we could take readings, all afternoon long. An amazing job, guys!

Getting Their Exercise

Friday, September 10 @ 2:58pm

We thought you'd like to know that the fire extinguisher at the transmitter site sports an old KWGS bumper sticker: "KWGS, FM89, MIND OVER CHATTER". That's from a few years back and it's still meaningful. We have two tower climbers up at the antenna, moving seven carefully positioned metal straps up and down, an inch at a time, while down on the ground we're watching what effect this has on tuning. It's a good thing our tower crew is in great shape, because every time they move a strap, they climb away from the antenna since their body presence affects measurements.

Taking Measurements

Friday, September 10 @ 11:47am

Tim Diehl is communicating with the tower crew, a thousand feet above, instructing them to push and pull four pistons on the "fine matcher" section of both antennas. Doing so changes the flatness of the line on the analyzer that he's watching, which indicates progressively better tuning. This is a slow process of "try this" with piston #1, then with piston #2, etc. When the ideal tuning point is found, the locknuts on the pistons are tightened. During this procedure, Public Radio 89.5's low-power signal is completely off-the-air.

Tuning the Antenna

Friday, September 10 @ 9:40am

Now comes the ballet between instrumentation on the ground and action in the air. Tim Diehl, with RF Solutions, is at the helm with his radio frequency measurement instruments. First, he'll look at the electrical integrity of both transmission lines (thousand-foot long vertical pipes) which connect the transmitters on the ground to the antennas above on the tower. Then the tower crew up high will reconnect the antennas, one at a time, and then Tim will electrically peer into them to see if everything is OK. After that, he'll tune each antenna for maximum signal reception for your radios. The sun is out and the winds are gusting; we're hoping that the weather will permit us to continue work.

Work Resumes

Thursday, September 9 @ 1:23pm

There's no sun yet, but the rain stopped and the wind has lessened just enough to safely resume work on the tower. We have the eight-element digital HD Radio antenna to connect to its thousand-foot-long vertical pipe. Both the analog and digital pipes must be shielded from falling ice. Final physical alignment of the antenna elements in relation to the tower is necessary. Parts which determine the antenna's signal pattern must be rotated into exact positions. The twin analog and digital antennas must be grounded to each other at critically-specific locations and also grounded to the tower to prevent lightning strikes from damaging anything. And after all of that, we can begin tuning the antennas.

Here Comes The Sun?

Thursday, September 9 @ 8:38am

Radar is showing the remnants of tropical storm Hermine moving east, away from Tulsa. Might the sun come out later today to allow us to climb the tower and continue work? Outside it's overcast and drizzling, but the sky is becoming brighter. Sunny skies and manageable winds are forecast for tomorrow, but if we could get a head start today on the remaining tower work before tuning the antenna, we'd jump (ur, climb) at the chance.

Initial Antenna Measurements

Wednesday, September 8 @ 9:40am

Our engineering team has begun taking measurements of the portion of our new antenna which was connected yesterday. This is in preparation for tuning the antenna for maximum coverage throughout northeastern Oklahoma. Two dry-air compressors are pressurizing that portion of the antenna, displacing moist air with dry to prevent internal arcs when we begin broadcasting at full power. Tropical storm Hermine is raining at the tower and it doesn't look like it will be safe to climb until Friday morning. For the eagle-eyed, yes, in the photo at left, the logo on both ballcaps says "A Prairie Home Companion." Your radio stations are in the hands of engineers who are strong, good-looking, and above average.

Here Comes Hermine

Tuesday, September 7 @ 3:04pm

We were blessed to be able to work all morning and a good part of the afternoon in the face of the tropical storm coming up from the south. The crew made it off of the tower just before the top of the tower disappeared into the clouds and it began to rain. It was a very productive day: one-half of the antenna was connected to the transmitters on the ground and the other antenna half needs just two custom-length connection pipes, which are being constructed right now. This storm extends all the way into Texas, so we'll keep watching for a break in the weather to continue the installation.

Watching the Radar

Tuesday, September 7 @ 10:08am

The skies are overcast and all is calm and dry this morning, but radar indicates that we're beng squeezed between two bands of rain - a cold front is dropping down from the northwest and remnants of tropical storm Hermine are sweeping up from Texas. Serious amounts of rain are forecast for Oklahoma, according to CNN. The crew is up on the tower, making good progress this morning. The question is how long will they have to work before rain starts to pour?

Up Early on the Tower

Tuesday, September 7 @ 7:25am

Our intrepid crew was up early this morning on the tower, trying to beat the storms forecast for later today. The winds are calm, so the crew should be able to make progress connecting the antennas to the thousand-foot long pipes connected to the transmitters at the base of the tower. As soon as the antennas are connected, we'll begin purging moisture in the pipes and interior regions of the antenna by pressurizing the system with dry air. This preparation will allow us to safely send high radio frequency voltage into the antenna.

Go, Gusty!

Monday, September 6 @ 7:34pm

Gusty outdid himself today. The tower crew stopped work around 1:30 this afternoon when winds kicked up too high. There's a full day's work remaining on the tower before we can tune the two new antennas and put them into service. The weather forecast calls for rain over the next three days, but there's a chance that the crew can work tomorrow morning before the storms hit.

Installing the Final Touches

Monday, September 6 @ 9:40am

If last Friday was blustery, yesterday's wind was positively Don Woods Gusty! Wind gusts of 32 mph were recorded on the ground near the Coweta tower and if it's blowing that hard down below, it's really blowing higher up. No, the bend in the photo at left isn't a camera lens aberration; that's the tower flexing in stiff winds. This morning the tower elevator was broken, but a repairman quickly arrived and fixed it. The tower crew is now installing parasitic elements behind each of our sixteen antenna elements - stiff stainless-steel rods which help optimize the antenna pattern.

What Radio Power Can Do

Sunday, September 5 @ 3:15pm

On the ground, while construction work progressed on the tower, we've been disassembling our old antenna, which was destroyed when huge chunks of ice fell from the top of the tower during an ice storm in January. The antenna is constructed from smaller diameter pipes carefully positioned inside of larger diameter pipes. Obvious outside damage to the antenna could be seen in bent and flattened antenna arms and broken orange insulators. What wasn't so obvious were points inside the antenna where radio frequency arcs jumped from the inner to outer pipes, burning holes. It was incredible that we were able to stay on-the-air for so long with an antenna that damaged until our new antenna could be constructed.

An Amazing Aerial Ballet

Sunday, September 5 @ 7:50am

It was a delicate operation, hoisting the new ice shield past and above the new antenna on the tower. Even with calm winds, the shield would sway back and forth within inches of the antenna. Deft handling of both the hoist and tag (guide) lines using winches on the ground brought the first part of the shield into position so that it could be bolted on the tower. Then the second half was hoisted into place. If you look carefully at the photo, the two dark areas on top of the shield are two tower climbers; a third climber can be seen near the top inside the tower. Our old ice shield was about the size of just one of the six rectangles that can be seen within the new shield.

New Ice Shield Goes Up

Saturday, September 4 @ 10:50am

The crew took advantage of the calm winds this morning to hoist the massive ice shield up the tower. The shield will be mounted above the antenna and it is designed to deflect ice falling from the tower above and break it into smaller pieces through heavy expanded-metal grates. We also hope today to finish the connections to the two antennas from the thousand-foot tall pipes connected to the transmitters below. Then we can begin pressurizing those pipes and antennas with dry air to chase out any moisture that may be inside before energizing the antenna system with high voltage radio signals.

A Blustery Day

Friday, September 3 @ 6:20pm

Winnie the Pooh may have enjoyed this blustery day, but he was never a tower climber. As is frequently the case after a cold front blows through, the winds remained quite gusty - enough to keep the tower crew grounded. Gusts of 23 mph on the ground corresponded to 60+ mph on the tower at one-thousand feet up, well over the safe limit of 30 mph at working height. The overnight part deliveries arrived and were made ready to install on the tower at the crack of dawn on Saturday morning.

Waiting for the Wind to Calm

Friday, September 3 @ 9:30am

The moon made an appearance yesterday near the tower and we caught this snapshot. Today's storm-free weather is ideal for tower work, but winds haven't calmed down enough after last night's showers to permit the crew to be on the tower. We're also waiting for overnight deliveries of a couple of key parts and preparing the huge ice shield to be hoisted tomorrow. Attention has turned to the fine details: carefully making transmission line connections which will hold pressure and work flawlessly for decades, installing parts on the antenna that will optimize coverage patterns to reach the greatest number of listeners, and making the antenna system safe when lightning strikes the tower, high winds blow, or ice falls.

Preparations on the Ground

Thursday, September 2 @ 11:09am

Down at the base of the tower where the KWGS and KWTU transmitters are located, Public Radio Tulsa chief engineer Brad Newman is making final adjustments on the copper piping which connects the transmitters to the antennas. The transmitters are located in a small room and virtually every inch of space, both horizontally and vertically, is taken up with transmission equipment and copper pipe. A massive signal combiner on an overhead steel mezzanine mixes both Public Radio 89.5 and Classical 88.7 together so that they can broadcast from the same antenna.

Oh, What a Beautiful Morning

Thursday, September 2 @ 9:25am

The storms of yesterday have abated and our tower crew is able to begin adding finishing touches to the antenna at the crack of dawn. There's a lot of little things to do, not the least of which is to hoist the new ice shield above the sixteen antenna elements. Right now, they're working to connect the antennas to the transmission lines, 3" inch diameter thousand-foot-long copper pipes. As soon as that is done, we'll begin purging the system of moisture - pumping dry air into the transmission lines and antennas to keep the high voltage inside from arcing and melting antenna components. The forecast this afternoon is for more storms, some possibly severe, so we're enjoying this beautiful morning with relatively calm winds for as long as possible.

Storms Slow Down Installation

Wednesday, September 1 @ 8:50am

Dark clouds, close lightning strikes, and rain chased the tower crew off the the tower late yesterday afternoon when a shower swept through southeastern Tulsa. Today, the forecast is for scattered showers all day long. Our number one concern is for the safety of those at the tower site. Imagine climbing on the largest jungle gym that you can imagine, made slick by rain, a thousand feet in the air. And remember that lightning tends to strike the highest object around? That would be the two-thousand foot tall grounded rod near you, disappearing into the clouds above. Because of the weather forecast, our anticipated back-to-normal broadcast day has slipped to Saturday.

All Sixteen Elements on the Tower

Tuesday, August 31 @ 4:40pm

All sixteen white fiberglass-encased antenna elements are now mounted on the Coweta tower and are being adjusted into position. Fair weather held today with no showers, but pretty significant wind on the tower at the one-thousand foot level. We'll be capping the open end of the antenna to prevent moisture from possible showers tonight entering into the antenna. Tomorrow we plan to mount the new and more sturdy ice shield over the antenna, put final touches on the antenna installation, connect the antenna to the thousand-foot-long vertical pipes which carry the radio signal from our transmitters on the ground to the antenna, and perform final tuning.

Same Song, Second Verse

Tuesday, August 31 @ 8:10am

The process of pre-assembling sections of the digital HD Radio antenna is halfway finished this morning. The digital antenna is nearly identical to the FM analog antenna, now mounted on the tower. Our tower crew will be inserting the elements of this digital antenna between the elements of our analog antenna to create a hybrid antenna with almost the same coverage patterns for both the analog and digital transmissions. We're keeping an eye on the weather, not only for the 40% chance of rain today, but the associated wind gusts as well.

New FM Analog Antenna Mounted

Monday, August 30 @ 7:50pm

A brief shower at the tower site was refreshing for those of us on the ground, but "freezing cold" for our tower crew 1000' up in the air. They got drenched and the really stiff breeze chilled them. Fortunately, the shower passed quickly and we were able to continue mounting all eight elements of our standard FM antenna. Tomorrow, weather permitting, we'll hoist and mount the last eight antenna elements that will connect to our HD Radio transmitters.

Old Ice Shield Coming Down

Monday, August 30 @ 1:35pm

The old ice shield, designed to protect our antenna from ice falling from above, was detached from the tower and lowered to the ground. You can see where this shield was mounted on the tower above the antenna in the top photo in the right-hand column. It did its job for many years, but was unable to stop ice from damaging our antenna in January. A new, larger, and stronger ice shield will be mounted above the new antenna. This shield, together with the fiberglass enclosures surrounding the antenna, should help prevent damage to the antenna similar to what was experienced earlier this year. An extreme example of tower and antenna icing can be seen here, on the Avalon Peninsula in Newfoundland.

New Antenna Going Up

Monday, August 30 @ 8:30am

The first sections of our new analog (standard FM) tower are being hoisted into position on the tower in Coweta. If the weather remains clear and winds stay calm, we should be able to mount all eight elements of the first half of our antenna and connect it to the transmission line, which connects to Public Radio 89.5 and Classical 88.7's transmitters at the base of the tower. Another huge thanks goes out to our good friends at Clear Channel Broadcasting, who are helping in numerous ways to keep our signals on the air through alternate transmitters in Tulsa.

What's Inside of the White Covers?

Sunday, August 29 @ 3:50pm

We were curious about what's inside of the white fiberglass coverings that protect our new antenna from ice. Instead of removing the many bolts around the cover to peek inside, we pointed our camera into one of the five "weep" holes (which allow dew to drain) on the bottom of the antenna element. What can be seen inside is a support structure in the middle, with the two antenna arms sweeping in a circle around the inside - the same element as seen in the black and white photo at the very bottom of this column. No progress was made today, due to extenuating circumstances, toward mounting the new antenna on the tower.

FM Analog Antenna Sections Ready

Saturday, August 28 @ 6:45pm

On the ground, they look like huge Tinkertoy parts ready to put together: eight round spools with rods stuck into them. These pre-assembled sections of the analog portion of our antenna, which broadcasts to standard FM radios, is ready to hoist up on the tower and put together into a roughly ninety-foot-long vertical antenna. After this section is installed, we'll assemble and hoist the matching digital antenna, which broadcasts to HD Radios.

Here's a photo from earlier this morning showing two of our tower-climbing crew strapped to the outside of the tower. They're disassembling the old antenna, section by section, and securing it to a steel cable for lowering to the ground. It's exacting, dangerous, work and acrophobics need not apply. The wind at the base of the tower was calm, but they said where they were, about a thousand feet up, was a pretty good breeze.

New Antenna Assembly

Saturday, August 28 @ 12:45pm

The old antenna is now off the tower and new antenna assembly has begun. The antenna element (white dome) is being mounted to the copper pipe which connects all sixteen antenna elements to the transmitter at the base of the tower. These antenna elements and pipe will be mounted to the leg of the Coweta tower facing Tulsa. Correct assembly and alignment is crucial to achieve the best coverage and also to withstand Oklahoma's high winds.

Old Antenna Coming Down

Saturday, August 28 @ 8:15am

The old antenna elements on the Coweta tower are coming down. Two antenna elements at a time (eight total elements) are being lowered from the 1000' level to the ground. In the photo at left, the length of the pipe connecting the two elements in the air is about eleven feet. As we examine the damage caused to the elements by falling ice, we marvel at how the stations stayed on the air so long. The old antenna should be off of the tower by noon.

The sixteen new antenna elements (eight for standard FM and eight for digital HD Radio) are in a storage container, ready to be assembled and hoisted into position. Each of the elements are covered by a white fiberglass radome (covering) to keep ice from building up on the elements and to help keep the elements from being damaged by falling ice.

Switched to Low Power Transmitters

Friday, August 27 @ 6:30pm

The antenna pictured at left is connected to the Classical 88.7 KWTU auxiliary transmitter. Both Public Radio 89.5 and Classical 88.7 are now broadcasting at 1/5 FCC-licensed power from alternate transmission sites. A huge thank you! goes out to our good friends at Clear Channel broadcasting, who are hosting KWGS this weekend at their emergency transmission site.

Internet Streaming Ready

Tuesday, August 24 @ 9:25am

Our Listen Live internet streaming page is ready to handle an increased number of listeners outside of the Tulsa metro area, who may have difficulty hearing Public Radio 89.5 and Classical 88.7 this weekend. Note that only the standard FM broadcasts will be on-air at low power during antenna replacement. From Friday through Monday evening, none of our six HD Radio channels will be on-air.

Antenna Preparations

Monday, August 23 @ 2:45 pm

Our new antenna is being prepared to be raised 1000' in the air and mounted on the Tulsa-facing leg of our tower. This 2000' tower, which we share with television channels 2, 6, 11, and 47, is located near Coweta, Oklahoma.

The current antenna is shown in the top right photo: eight egg-beater-like antenna elements are mounted vertically on the tower leg facing Tulsa.

The new antenna, seen at left, will have sixteen elements - eight for standard FM broadcasts at both 88.7 and 89.5 and another eight for HD Radio transmissions. The additional eight elements will permit us to, at some future date, significantly increase the power and broadcast range of our six HD Radio channels.

The sixteen antenna elements will be enclosed in white fiberglass enclosures, which will help both stations remain at full power during ice storms and help protect the antenna elements from ice falling from the top of the tower.

Frequently Asked Questions

E-mail your questions about this project or call us - use the address and phone number at the bottom of this page

I'm confused - on-air you say that you're back to normal, but this antenna journal web page contradicts that.

Ah! You've been hearing promotional announcements for our KAKC special, which will be reprised Friday at 8:00. That announcement states last week's special broadcast was at low power and the repeat broadcast will be at normal power. It's logical then, since the repeat is tonight, to assume that our antenna has already been replaced and we're back to normal. But that's not so - yet. We fervently hope to be back at normal power for tonight's rebroadcast, but at this moment (Friday afternoon) KWGS is completely off-the-air for antenna tuning. [Update: we did return to full power two hours before the repeat played.]

Why didn't you just tell us it would be a week to 10 days?!

Because in our wildest nightmares we had no idea that it would take this long. What started our as a 3-4 day project turned into two weeks and counting, primarily because of weather that made it unsafe to climb the tower. Listeners outside of the Tulsa metro area are unable to hear either station and the broadcasts within Tulsa are plagued by dropouts and other signal problems.

What's with all of these custom-made pipes? Why didn't you buy the right parts to begin with?

Replacing an antenna is a lot like remodeling a kitchen. Old appliances need to be removed and new ones fitted into position. The plumber isn't able to exactly anticipate the length and route of every connection beforehand. So it is with antenna replacement. All of the parts necessary to mount the antenna (think kitchen sink faucet) were received from the factory and were used in the installation. But our new antenna is being connected to existing transmission lines (pipes) - one of which connected to our old antenna and a second line that was purchased from one of the television stations transmitting on the same tower. These pipe connections need to avoid the two-man open elevator which runs through the middle of the tower and every other TV and radio transmission line. They must be securely mounted on the tower to withstand tornado-force winds. In addition, a custom ice shield covering the horizontal runs of our twin transmission lines is being constructed and will be installed to prevent ice that falls inside of the tower from smashing these lines and taking our stations off-the-air.

Should I take my car to the shop to have my radio looked at?

While Click and Clack, our beloved Tappet Brothers, would undoubtedly have a cleverer answer to this question, the short answer is no. Here's the long answer: as they used to say during the opening of the original Outer Limits, "Do not attempt to adjust the picture. We are controlling transmission. If we wish to make it louder, we will bring up the volume. If we wish to make it softer, we will tune it to a whisper...." Ok, we're showing our age here, but we're almost completely sure that there's nothing wrong with your radio that a little time and patience won't fix. The same goes for your table and Walkman (ur, iPod Nano) FM radios. If you're having problems picking up Classical 88.7 or Public Radio 89.5 next week, check here first and then take your car into the shop.

Why is this taking so long?

We're installing one of the most complicated FM antennas made today, which has twice as many elements as most antennas. Each part must be critically aligned, a thousand feet in the air during hard wind gusts. Additionally, securing the correct parts to do the job right takes time. Our foremost concern is safety, not only for the crew on the tower and on the ground, but also of the massive 2000' tower from which we and six other TV and FM stations use.

Why are you playing religious music?

Listeners in Muskogee - well outside of the reach of our temporary Tulsa-only low-power signal - may get the impression that we're now playing religious music on Classical 88.7. In the absence of KWTU's signal, their radios are picking up another station which broadcasts religious programming on the same frequency. Once KWTU begins broadcasting at full power from our new antenna later this week, classical music will again be heard in northeastern Oklahoma on 88.7 FM.

Will my reception improve?

A definite maybe. Certainly reception will improve compared to what you were receiving over the last six months from our damaged antenna. But will this new sixteen-element antenna deliver a vastly improved signal? The answer is no; we'll be back once again to our FCC-licensed power and defined coverage area. FM analog reception, on your old-fashioned FM radios in your home and car, will be back to normal. HD Radio reception, on a new-fangled HD Radio, will be back to normal, as well. But sometime in the future, we'll have the opportunity to improve HD Radio coverage by a considerable amount by utilizing the additional eight elements included in our new antenna.

What's all this concern about ice?

In Oklahoma, broadcast engineers worry about two weather patterns: tornadic winds in summer and ice buildup on towers in the winter. Earlier this year, towers fell to the ground in Lawton, which received more ice than we did in Tulsa. In previous years, a tower in the vicinity of our Coweta tower fell due to excessive ice buildup. An extreme example of tower and antenna icing can be seen here, on the Avalon Peninsula in Newfoundland.

When ice coats an antenna, which is likely two-thousand feet up even in mild winter weather, it impedes the transmission of radio and television signals. When that ice warms and falls from the tower, it becomes a hazard not only to antennas lower on the tower (such as ours) but also to the transmitter buildings, vehicles, and people on the ground. One winter, a huge ice chunk knocked a hole in the thick reinforced concrete ceiling right above our transmitter. As you can imagine, dripping water and high voltage didn't mix very well. Innumerable broadcast engineers working at transmitter sites have returned to their vehicles during winter weather to find their pickups smashed by refrigerator-sized chunks of ice.

How do I receive HD Radio?

HD Radio broadcasts stations which are hidden in-between FM stations. KWTU and KWGS each broadcast not just one channel, but four: an analog FM signal which can be received on the FM radio that you're familiar with in addition to three digital HD Radio signals: a CD-quality version of the standard analog FM channel, and up to three additional signals that you can't listen to without a HD Radio.

Public Radio Tulsa broadcasts eight signals in total on 88.7 and 89.5. There are a number of HD Radio signals across the FM and AM band in Tulsa and thousands more broadcasting across the country. Learn more about HD Radio here and discover what hidden channels are available in this station guide.

Antenna Replacement

January Ice Storm Damage

Large chunks of ice broke and bent much of our FM antenna

Public Radio Tulsa's antenna, located on a tower in Coweta, Oklahoma near the Muskogee Turnpike, has been broken since January. This has resulted in poor reception by many listeners throughout Green Country. The photo at left shows what a good antenna element should look like. This picture was taken about 1000' in the air, facing Tulsa. The wide road seen under the antenna is the Muskogee Turnpike.

A replacement antenna, to be installed over the weekend of August 27-30, should result in improved FM radio and HD radio coverage on 88.7 and 89.5.

During the antenna replacement weekend we'll be broadcasting with very low power from alternate antenna sites. Because of this, you may not be able to receive either KWTU or KWGS in areas outside of Tulsa. Within the city, the signals will be either stronger or weaker than normal, depending on your location. By Tuesday the 31st, reception should be back to normal and hopefully even improved.

This photo shows an orange insulator that was broken by falling ice. Other parts of the antenna are dented and bent beyond repair. The antenna is no longer made and repair estimates exceed the cost of replacing the antenna with a newer model, which will permit greatly improved HD Radio transmission.

The four-day process of replacing the antenna will involve signing off-the-air, disconnecting and lowering each of the eight old antenna elements to the ground. Then each of the sixteen new antenna elements will be raised approximately 1000' in the air and connected by our tower crew. Electrical tests and fine-tuning will then be performed, leading to full-power operation by Tuesday morning.

During these four days, we plan to broadcast at low power from alternative transmission sites, thanks to the generousity of our friends at Clear Channel broadcasting. These low-power transmissions should be able to be clearly heard within the city of Tulsa, but not in outlying areas in northeastern Oklahoma.